One wire lightning detector & I-button

Hi
I install VirtualVP trial all went well except.(Great Program) I cannot get my hobby board one wire lightning detector & I-button set-up in WD. All was well before installing VVP. Do I need to do something else to get it working?

Thanks
BTrip

I’m not familiar enough with the 1-wire lightning detector to be able to answer your question. Brian may be more familiar with the 1-wire, and he uses VVP, so he might have a suggestion. Otherwise, if you can tell me more about how the 1-wire connects and communicates with WD, I might be able to offer some ideas.

Steve

Hi
The 1-wire (USB Port Adapters-DS9490R http://www.maxim-ic.com/products/ibutton/products/1wire_adapters.cfm#USB )connects USB and communicates with WD. Have not be able to connect to the adapter scince installing VVP.This is about all I know.

Thanks
BTrip

That link helped. The driver for the USB adapter you linked is probably creating a virtual COM port that conflicts with the virtual COM ports created by the N8VBvCOM driver that most people use with VirtualVP. The default installation of N8VBvCOM creates the following virtual COM ports: COM6, COM7, COM8, COM9, COM16, COM17, COM18, and COM19. See if you have a configuration program that came with your USB adapter or find out what virtual COM port number it creates and either reconfigure that driver or the N8VBvCOM driver to remove any conflict. They can’t both create a virtual COM port with the same number. I’m not 100% sure this is what’s happening in your case, but it is the most likely explanation.

Steve

Hmmm…that’s a bit worrying. I was thinking of having a try with VirtualVP, but I’m wondering whether I might get a clash between VVP and the Serial->USB converter I run my VP2 on. That creates virtual COM ports so might I end up with a similar clash?

The N8VBvCOM driver has a configuration tool which lets you specify whatever COM port numbers you want to use. So at worst you would just need to change any conflicting COM port numbers to a different number. It doesn’t even require a reboot. I wrote the configuration tool and donated it to the driver author’s project. I chose default COM numbers above COM5 to help avoid conflicts since most stuff uses the low numbers. But changing the defaults is easy.

Steve

I’ve just taken a look and my serial->USB converter default to COM5/6 so it’s probably lucky I saw this thread before I tried VVP!

Hi
Try configuration program (1 wire port selector) that came with the USB adapter. I set it to com 2. Started VVP ran the 1 wire port selector program on com 2 still good, did the same thing with weather link all still good. Did the same with WD all good until I went into the WD control panel Dallas 1 wire set up and did a save/reset could not find lightning detector. Ran 1 wire port selector on com 2 could not find port. Than I set-up VVP to run on com 2 and USB adapter on com 1 did not have any luck. I also try adding ports in the VcomCofigurator but again no luck.

Thanks
BTrip

maybe you need to change the port number in wd ?

Windy,
Which WD file would have the WD config info for his 1-wire detector COM setup?

Bdtripps,
If you could send me that WD file, as well as virtualvp.ini from the VirtualVP folder and the N8VBvCOM.inf file from the N8VBvCOM folder, that would help me sort this out. Send them to [email protected]

Steve

Hi, Try changing port number in wd no luck. E-mailing files.
Thanks
BTrip

Chris
I use VVP with my VP2 and my USB-Serial converter for my envoy. No problems. I set the com port in windows and then use the same comport in VVP setup. Piece of cake … errr whatever is good across the pond. :slight_smile:

Piece of cake translates perfectly!

When you say you set the Comport…do you mean in VVP, or the IP driver or for your USB->Serial converter?

I probably shouldn’t try this late in the evening, but I’m going to download VVP now and see what happens!

there is a setting in VVP that you set the comport to. Tinplate’s docs are quite good on the setup. you will also need to change the comport in WD + whatever else you want to run to one of the 4 “virtual” ports. I believe the default is 16-19. Again, it sounds confusing buts its real simple once you see the menus :slight_smile:

That was too easy :wink:

To protect my ‘real’ COM6, I had to change the driver to use comports 7/8/9/10/17/18/19/20 and then tell VVP to use those ports. The only confusion I found was setting WD up. VVP displays VCOM ports 17-20, so I assumed I had to connect WD to one of those ports. However, WD only seems to allow me to use ports up to COM12. I connected to COM7 and it seems to be working, but it wasn’t intuitive. I feel as though I should connect to VCOM17 because that’s a port displayed by VVP.

You’re in good company, because the virtual com port numbering confuses lots of people. It’s probably the number one configuration problem. I need to come up with a good way to explain it, or hide that complexity. The reason it works the way it works is because Windows allows only one program to connect to a numbered com port. N8VBvCOM creates pairs of virtual com ports, and connects the two ports with a virtual cable. VVP hooks up to one end of the cable (COM16 for instance) and the weather program hooks up to the other end (COM6 for instance). From VVP’s point of view, it only needs to know the number of the end it hooks up to. It doesn’t know or control what the number is that the weather program will use - that’s configured in the N8VBvCOM driver.

What I probably should do, is parse the N8VBvCOM configuration file and display in the VVP Com setup screen what the port number is that the weather program should hook to. This would avoid some confusion, but there is nothing stopping someone from changing the N8VBvCOM configuration file without telling the driver to use the new information (in which case VVP would be suggesting the wrong port).

Steve

That’s a very helpful explanation :slight_smile:

I see your problem with people changing the settings, but I think it’s more confusing displaying VCOM17 when that’s effectively an internal VVP/driver connection point rather than COM7 which is what most people will be dealing with in their end-user software.

Hi
Just to follow up, with VVP off and I set WD to com1 the lightning detector starts with no problems. But when I have VVP running & WD set com7 lightning detector cannot be found.

BTrip